Punishment came swift and severe yesterday. A staggeringly errant trainer was shamed and banished for eight years. But for the image of racing, scarred by an episode as traumatic as it was dramatic, this was not an end, merely a basis to move forward.

As with Luis Suarez, in the week’s other sporting scandal, the length of Mahmood Al Zarooni’s ban was little more than a footnote to the main event. It was the offence itself that will forever haunt his memory, the offence that will resonate darkly with the public.